Talking Points — In the Republican Congress, 100 Days of Contempt for Hard-Working Families

From U.S. House of Representatives Democratic Leader Nancy Pelosi's office:

First 100 Days of the Republican Congress

Last week, House Republicans marked 100 days of the new Republican Congress – 100 days spent stacking the deck for their special-interest friends against everyone else. 

With both chambers of Congress, Republicans have missed no chance to show their contempt for hard-working families:

·         Dragging the Department of Homeland Security to the brink of shutdown, endangering the security of our entire nation to satisfy the most radical anti-immigrant voices of their party;

·         Voting to deport DREAMers striving for a future in the only home they’ve ever known;

·         Voting to strip health coverage from millions of American families, to enable insurance companies to deny coverage to people with pre-existing conditions, and to restore limits on lifetime care;

·         Advancing an unprecedented assault on women’s comprehensive health care, placing radical new restrictions on how women with private insurance can spend private dollars;

·         Voting to end the Medicare guarantee as we know it and subject seniors to skyrocketing health costs.

Hard-working families need bigger paychecks and better infrastructure, but Republicans can’t be bothered to help.  After the first 100 days of Republican embarrassments on the floor and special-interest priorities on the agenda, it doesn’t seem the next 100 will be any better.

Republican Estate Tax Repeal

While Democrats are championing plans to move America forward by raising wages and cutting taxes for hard-working families, Republicans are stuck on a carousel ride as they focus on yet another deficit-exploding Republican tax giveaway to millionaires and billionaires. 

While the American people filed taxes for tax day, Republicans were advancing a completely unpaid-for effort to repeal the federal estate tax – a staggering plan to increase the deficit by $269 billion with a tax break that applies to only the 5,400 wealthiest estates in America.

·         Instead of cutting taxes for hard-working families, Republicans are handing billions and billions of dollars to the top 0.2 percent;

·         While hard-working Americans are scraping together to save for a house, for college, to start a business, or for a secure retirement, House Republicans are giving 5,400 estates a tax break worth an average of $2.5 million apiece – more than the typical college graduate earns in an entire lifetime.

The American people have had enough of Republicans taking the tools of opportunity away from hard-working Americans to give bigger tax breaks to the super wealthy.  We need a better plan and a better set of values to build a strong and prosperous future for America.

Missing Budget Deadlines

Last week, as hard-working Americans prioritized to file their taxes ahead of Tax Day on April 15, even with control of both chambers of Congress, Republicans failed to meet the April 15 deadline to pass a budget.

Now, a belated Republican conference committee huddles in secret, prioritizing the desires of the ultra-wealthy and special interests over the dire needs of hard-working American families.

House Republicans’ “Work Harder for Less” Budget perfectly captures their priorities: massive tax giveaways for the special interests and ultra-wealthy paid for by making life harder for middle class families.  The Republican budget:

·         Destroys destroy 2.9 million jobs in 2017, and decreases economic growth by 2.5 percent. 

·         Greenlights the Romney-Ryan plan to give millionaires a $200,000 tax break while increasing taxes on the average middle class family by $2,000;

·         Ends the Medicare guarantee;

·         Ends higher education tax credits and ends the boost in the child tax credit;

·         Strips millions of Americans of tax credits for affordable health care.

·         Ignores our crumbling infrastructure and surrenders American leadership in education, research and innovation.

House Democrats believe in a budget that invests in the hard-working Americans who are the backbone of our country: making it easier to buy a home, easier to pay for college, easier to save for a secure and enjoyable retirement. 

Democrats will continue to stand for opportunity, prosperity and dignity for every American – not just the wealthy and well connected by working to bring bigger paychecks and better infrastructure to the American people.

Protecting American Consumers

Today, House Republicans are making another attempt to undermine the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, which protects hard-working American consumers, by slashing funding for this vital watchdog group. 

Republicans are pushing an insidious scheme to transform a bipartisan bill establishing three advisory boards to provide information about small businesses, credit unions and community banks into a brazen attempt to cut funding for the consumer protection group to limit its ability to support consumer financial protections. 

Instead of supporting consumer financial protections essential to stabilizing the economy, promoting competition and transparency, and restoring confidence to the consumer financial marketplace, this bill will undermine the CFPB’s ability to protect consumers:

·         Establishing new requirements for the CFPB, then stripping the funding necessary to fund that work, and

·         Capping the CFPB’s budget, which drastically cuts funding by $50 million in FY 2020 and nearly $100 million in FY 2025.

Rather than strengthen the agency that has empowered consumers, protected college students, and provided hard-working Americans with free and regular access to their credit scores, House Republicans are undermining CFPB’s ability to protect consumers from the worst abuses in the financial marketplace.